Set Your Mind in Motion

So my crazy ex-third flatmate Victor Ninox and I went to our rich friend Silver’s place to play with his PlayStation Move. And after we got bored with that in about six minutes, we played his Xbox 360 Kinect. And it was while we were standing there flailing our arms at the TV that Vic became characteristically irritated.

“This is crap,” he said. “PC should have something like this. Why does console get all the good stuff?”

I shrugged, which accidentally sent my white-water raft crashing into a jutting spire of rock and breaking every virtual bone in my virtual rafter’s virtual body.

“I dunno,” I said. “I’m not convinced by the whole thing. I mean, the whole march of human progress has been in the pursuit of more elaborate and elegant tools. Being human is all about taking a thing in your hand and doing stuff that no mere animal could ever hope to do. Kill predators six times our size. Make plants grow where we want. Tame animals. Drive powered exoskeletons at three times the speed of the fastest land animal. Fly in the air and fly in space. And cook really awesome barbeque.”

“So what you’re saying,” said Silver from where he was sitting absolutely still on the couch so as not to confuse the Kinect while Vic and I were playing, “is that you don’t approve of hands-free control?”

“No, I guess I don’t,” I said. “The last game I played on Xbox was Halo: Reach. Sure, it’s the same as all the other Halos but I was shooting stuff and jumping out of stuff and switching weapons and getting cussed out by Texans… and now look at this. Really simple arcade games.” I pointed at the screen, which again pretty much ruined everything for my virtual rafter.

“Nah,” said Vic. “Hands free is awesome. Is the natural progression. We started with tools but pretty soon we’ll just manipulate the world with our MINDS. We’ll be like Gods! MWAHAHAHA!”

“You honestly believe,” I said, “that Kinect is a stepping stone on the road to transhuman enlightenment?”

“ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED! Smash your face on the paddle! 80 points!” said the Xbox 360.

“I mean look at it,” said Vic. “So sure at the moment you’re pretty much just exchanging your controller for a larger controller at the front of the room that’s less accurate and only works when you stand up. Next step after this is to have it directly pick up electromagical signals from your brain-hole so you can control the little man on the screen.

“In fact,” Vic went on, “I see non-physical control getting like so subtle and stuff, that you won’t even have to operate the game on a go-here, do-this basis, you’ll just like WILL the guy to win and he will.”

“While you sit back and watch?” I asked.

“No, you’ll be willing him to win.”

“So exactly like a movie?”

“The problem with you,” said Vic, “is that you don’t have the future-vision. All this crap about flintlocks and sabre-toothed tigers… you’re living in the past, man.”

“I think everything should go hands-free,” Silver said from his position on the couch. “I’m all about hands-free.”

“YOU’RE all about hands-free?” I spluttered. “Don’t you have like a pneumatic girlfriend in the hot tub out the back?”

“Oh crap I was supposed to SMS her to see if the tub was hot enough yet,” said Silver, grappling for his iPhone 4. “But anyway yeah, hands free sex man, can you imagine? It would be the ultimate head-rush. You’d just like stand there and thrash around and the light would like glisten off your bodies, and there could be like awesome music too…”

“I thought that was called clubbing?” I snapped.

“Why do you get so irritated every time we talk about the future, man?” Vic demanded.

“Because what you say is always so stupid!” I said. “Hands-free sex? Interaction-free games? Every future thing you talk about is just a thing from the past with a different plastic case and a $199 RRP sticker! Like what the hell is the point of the Kinect? Why the hell did they invent it? To make shitty games shittier and harder to control? I just don’t get it! And other, finer satirical minds than mine have already pointed out that Sony criticised the Wiimote for being a lollipop… and then brought out a controller that actually looks like a lollipop! Why did they bother? These things only cost like, the price of two games so why not just put all that millions of dollars of R&D into making two really awesome games that everyone wants to buy? Why does there have to be a bloody new pointless thing every six weeks? Hell Silver, have you even watched anything in 3D on this 3D TV?”

“Yes,” said Silver sulkily. “I watched Avatar on 3D Blu-ray.”

“OH MY GOD!” I screamed. “Didn’t you already SEE that FOUR TIMES at a 3D cinema with a much bigger screen, better seats, better sound and better popcorn?”

“None of what you say is the point,” said Vic with uncommon clarity. “The point is that we like new stuff. We like the unboxing experience. And we like knowing we’re the only guy on the block with the liquid cash to buy it on day-one.”

“Stuff it then,” I said, limbering up my elbows. “Once more down the rapids, dear friends?”

“Once more,” agreed Silver. “Then I have to go get in the hot tub.”